


Lost and Found

by MonkeyBard



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fluff, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-07-23 09:36:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20006149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MonkeyBard/pseuds/MonkeyBard
Summary: John makes a discovery.





	Lost and Found

**Author's Note:**

> Date: 27 July 2019  
> JWP #27: A Most Unusual Patient: Watson receives an unusual patient whose presence inspires today’s work.

John was on a break, out to grab some lunch, when he heard it. The plaintive mewling didn’t quite sound human. Considering the weather—hot and miserable—John certainly hoped it wasn’t a baby someone had abandoned. Whatever it might be, he followed the noise to its source in a filthy alley that lived up to the worst reputation of such passageways.  
  
The stink of rotting garbage was strong in the heat, mingling with the scent of car exhaust from the nearby crowded street. He stopped, listening hard. For a moment he feared he’d lost sound, but there it came again and he moved towards it down the alley.  
  
It came from somewhere around a skip about half way along. Wishing he had a pair of gloves, he began to pick cautiously through the debris surrounding the container.  
  
He found the source of the pathetic noises in a half-rotted cardboard box beneath a scrap of tarpaulin. A mama cat and two tiny kittens, their eyes not even open. All looked half starved and more than half parched. He moved slowly and carefully, not wanting to startle the mama away from the kittens. But it seemed she hadn’t the energy to run and she only put up the weakest of protesting hisses when he reached a hand out to her.  
  
He needed something better than the box she’d chosen as a nest. Looking around at the trash-cluttered alley, he thought he spotted his answer: a deep, cracked plastic bucket with a broken handle. He quickly fetched it and returned to the sad feline trio. There was nothing in the alley to line the bucket with, so he stripped off his t-shirt and laid it in the bottom. Slowly, gently he transferred the cats to the bucket. They all felt rail thin and fragile as fine china.  
  
He didn’t know where to find a veterinarian’s office nearby, but the clinic where he worked was just a short distance away. There at least he could make them comfortable, get them some water or even sub-cu fluids, and look up what else to do until he could get them to an emergency vet.  
  
He picked up the bucket in both arms. “Come on, kitties. I’m going to take you somewhere safe.”  
  
It looked like he had three new patients to tend to.


End file.
